The list comes months after Daniel DiNardo promised more accountability and transparency from the Catholic Church.

Author:
Jeremy Rogalski, Tina Macias, Matt Keyser

Published:
11:39 AM CST January 31, 2019

Updated:
10:26 PM CST January 31, 2019

HOUSTON — The Archdiocese of Galveston-Houston named 40 priests it deemed “credibly accused” of sexual abusing children in an effort to be more “accountable and transparent” in the priest sex abuse crisis.

The archdiocese joined 13 other Texas dioceses in releasing lists for the first time. Prior to today, the Diocese of Fort Worth was the only diocese in the state that had released names. In total, more than 300 clergy have been named.

The list, which dates back to 1950, includes 23 diocesan priests, 13 religious order priests and four visiting priests. In addition, two other priests, John Keller and Manuel LaRosa-Lopez, are listed as under investigation.

The archdiocese has 448 priests, according to its website, and serves 1.7 million Catholics across 147 parishes.

Cardinal Daniel DiNardo, the archbishop of Galveston-Houston and president of the U.S. Conference of Bishops, expressed his “deepest regret for the harm that has been done” and acknowledged that the church has failed to protect "the most vulnerable souls entrusted to our care."

"For the survivors, for those who are wounded, this is a day in which they can say, 'I'm not alone,'" DiNardo said. "It's a day of anger: anger of the part of the faithful when they see these names, anger on the part of survivors. There's some anger with me, but I bear the responsibility, which I want to accept.

“There is no excuse for the actions of those credibly accused of such sins against a human person."

The archdiocese held a rosary service at the Co-Cathedral of the Sacred Heart after the list was released this afternoon and called for prayers, but there was no mention of the accused priests or survivors.

Outside the church, Belinda Kaylani, a survivor of priest abuse, shared her story and said she wasn’t surprised the priest she said abused her was left off the list. Kaylani said there would be no justice until there is an independent review of all allegations against priests.

“If it’s your daughter, your son, what’s going to motivate you to do something?” Kaylani said. “I’ve heard people say they will pray. Well, what I’m doing is praying. I’m here in action, demanding that you release those names.”

The release comes months after DiNardo promised more accountability and transparency from the church.

“We must begin the healing process by eliminating the evil of sexual abuse,” DiNardo said in a video statement in October 2018.

A month before that announcement, LaRosa-Lopez was arrested on child indecency charges. Two accusers claimed the priest molested them in the early 1990 and early 2000s while he served the Sacred Heart parish in Conroe. The case prompted the Montgomery County District Attorney’s Office to search and seize evidence from the archdiocese’s secret archives in November.

During that search, the DA’s office said it found other documents relating to clergy to sex abuse, which it said it turned over to the Texas Rangers.

Tyler Dunman, special crimes bureau chief for the Montgomery County DA's Office, said the archdiocese's list is "more or less what we expected" but added "we're not in a position to compare anything to what they provided."

"We're still in the process of our investigation, so I can't tell you if the list is complete, if it's thorough, if it's lacking," Dunman said. "We're focused on what we obtained in our evidence and we haven't concluded that process."

The Montgomery County DA’s Office announced this morning that another pastor, Ronald Mitchell of the Body of Christ Ministry in Magnolia, was sentenced to 75 years in prison after he was found guilty on five counts of sexual assault of a child.

Though DiNardo has touted the church's transparency, critics said that despite those claims of transparency, the church is still hiding abusers.

Michael Norris, SNAP spokesman

KHOU

Standing outside the Chancery Thursday afternoon, Michael Norris head of the Houston chapter of the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (SNAP), called the archdiocese’s list incomplete.

“They’re an order of magnitude off,” Norris said, calling the number of priests named "absurd."

He cited the number of priests named in Buffalo, New York, and Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania – dioceses much smaller than Galveston-Houston – that was more than doubled.

“What it comes down to, there are more perps in this town,” Norris said.

Norris conceded the church’s actions are a “small steps towards transparency,” but added “we’re not there yet.”

The archdiocese did list when priests were removed from ministry, when they retired or when they died, but unlike the Archdiocese of San Antonio, it didn't include the number of allegations against each priest.

Researcher Siobhan Fleming said she would have liked to have seen more details of each accused priest.

"I would have liked to have seen on this list when the complaint was made, what date, how many people made a complaint about each one of these priests," Fleming said. "That is very important."

Without that information, she said it's difficult to determine whether the archdiocese acted as it should once it knew about the allegations of sexual abuse.

A notable name on the list is Rev. Terence Brinkman, whose abuse allegations are detailed in the KHOU documentary “Unforgivable.”

Brinkman was sued in 2010 by a man who claimed the priest sodomized him in the mid-1970s while he was in an altar boy at St. Charles Borromeo Church on Houston’s north side. Brinkman denied the allegations and a judge dismissed the case because the statute of limitations had expired.

For decades, the Catholic Church has dealt with the priest sex abuse crisis as allegations have surfaced worldwide.

The church has paid out more than $3 billion to settle sexual abuse claims, according to an analysis of BishopAccountability.org, an online database that tracks the sex abuse crisis.

More than 6,800 U.S. Catholic priests have been credibly accused of sexual abuse, according to an analysis by BishiopAccountability.org of U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishop data, and there are at least 19,000 survivors of sexual abuse by U.S. Catholic priests.

As of December, at least 70 of the 196 U.S. Catholic dioceses had released the names of credibly accused priests, according to BishopAccountability.org. Prior to today, the Diocese of Fort Worth was the only one in Texas to release a list.

Pope Francis has also spoken openly about the clergy sex abuse crisis.

During his annual Christmas speech at the Vatican last year, the pope vowed the church would never again cover up clergy sex abuse and issued a stark warning to abusers, “convert and hand yourself over to human justice and prepare for divine justice.”

“Let it be clear that before these abominations the Church will spare no effort to do all that is necessary to bring justice whosoever has committed such crimes,” Francis said.

He acknowledged the church’s failure in the past but urged survivors to come forward.

The pope called all world bishops to meet at the Vatican in February to discuss the crisis.

KHOU 11 Investigates spent three months researching the crisis for the documentary “Unforgivable.”

The documentary details the crisis and its impact on survivors, their families and the missions by an attorney and a priest to make a difference.

The archdiocese last released a list of 22 priests credibly accused of sexual assault in 2004.